Guts!
Mark Lyte’s lab in Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center campus in Abilene, Texas, is growing stuff from [grossness alert!] monkey feces.
The alimentary canal is an interesting place that plays host to trillions of bugs. The genetic material of all these guests—weighing more than five pounds in an individual!—is called the microbiome, almost an organ in itself.
Lyte:
You wouldn’t believe what we’re extracting out of poop. We found that the guys here in the
Genesis 18:1−19:38
Failure to keep the way of God results in punishment, but the prayers (and life) of one keeping that way precludes it.
This section is essentially the story of Lot and of Sodom and Gomorrah, with divine justice as a distinct theme.
Abraham’s household is called to be characterized by keeping Yahweh’s way in righteousness and justice, in contrast to the depravity and turpitude characterizing the locale where Lot is situated—described as wicked and evil (19:7, 9). Aligning
Ladder!
For most of May, I was in the Holy Land with a bunch of enterprising students from Dallas Seminary. “Enterprising” because this was a three-week course: Biblical Geography and History. Which meant they had lectures, quizzes, finals. Which meant they had to take notes while sightseeing. Which meant that after grueling days, averaging 5–6 miles a day on foot under the hot sun of the Middle East for three whole weeks, they had to return to their hotels and
Days!
Procrastination, someone once said, has its good side. You have something to do tomorrow.
I kinda like that. Why fill today doing stuff, when I can fill tomorrow (and the day after, and the day after that, and …) doing the same stuff.
In any case, it isn’t kindly looked upon by mothers and managers and ministers. It is proclaimed an evil to be avoided or, at least, conquered.
And beating procrastination may be easier to conquer than you thought, whether it be for sermon
Sole Passion!
I was recently interviewed about singleness and celibacy in Dallas Theological Seminary’s quarterly magazine, Kindred Spirit. For the interview see here.
(BTW, the entire issue is focused on “Singles and the Church,” and may be accessed here. Feel free to read, pass on, or otherwise disseminate.)
Also, in conjunction with that issue, another interview of me with my colleague and friend, Dr. Darrell Bock, was posted on Dallas Seminary’s Table Podcast. Darrell
Tenants!
I bought a new home a few weeks ago.
From a colleague of mine from Dallas Seminary, Timothy Warren. (To read his preaching philosophy, go here.) Timothy and his wife weren’t ready to move out just yet; their new place of residence elsewhere had things to be done to it.
So the Warrens became … my tenants. Paying me rent. Well, for a few days.
My association with Timothy goes back almost two decades.It began with him being my teacher. Then I became his friend. Later his
John Koessler: How I Preach
John Koessler: And this is How I Preach …
[John is a fellow Evangelical Homiletics Society (EHS) member, and a fellow teacher of preaching (at Moody Bible Institute). Prolific writer, insightful preacher, with an enviable dry sense of humor, John’s writing and speaking are well worth attending to. Even the papers he presents at EHS, the book reviews and articles he writes for the Journal of the Evangelical Homiletics Society and other journals, and his radio
Abe Kuruvilla is the Carl E. Bates Professor of Christian Preaching at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (Louisville, KY), and a dermatologist in private practice. His passion is to explore, explain, and exemplify preaching.